The Electric State Parent Guide

In the early 1990s, humans are losing a war against robots who want to be free from the menial jobs to which they are confined. Then tech mogul Ethan Skate (Stanley Tucci) invents the Neurocaster, a device which allows humans to link their brains with drone soldiers, eliminating human deaths and allowing them to defeat the bots. Come peacetime, Skate’s Sentre corporation enjoys market dominance: his Neurocaster not only powers drones, it allows humans to literally divide their attention – enabling part of their brains to work while the other part engages in more pleasurable virtual worlds.

As Skate flourishes, teenager Michelle (Millie Bobby Brown) languishes in a miserable foster home, having lost her parents and younger brother, Christopher (Woody Norman) in a car accident. Michelle doesn’t simply miss her adored brother, she also grieves for his lost potential: Christopher was a math prodigy and Michelle believed he would change the world.

One night, a Cosmo bot (Alan Tudyk) appears in Michelle’s room and convinces her that he contains Christopher’s consciousness. Since he can only speak in quotes from his classic animated tv show, it takes Michelle some time to figure out who he is and what she must do to find her brother - apparently alive and controlling the bot. Her journey to save her brother will take her across the country, team her up with a drifter named Keats (Chris Pratt), and entangle Christopher’s fate with that of robots and the future of humanity.

The plot is certainly ambitious, providing a sprawling adventure, some persuasive world building, and lots of big issues to chew on. It’s also more than a little derivative. During its two hour runtime, the film deals with human-cyber consciousness (see The Creator), virtual reality technology effectively sedating humans (see Wall-E), virtual networks undermining human relationships (Ron’s Gone Wrong), human/android relationships (The Iron Giant or After Yang), and robot wars (The Creator and The Mitchells vs the Machines). The breadth of the film’s scope results in an occasional lack of focus, especially during the first half of the film.

Luckily, the second half of the movie is a big improvement, speeding up the action and enriching the emotional connections between the characters – robot and human. And Stanley Tucci is brilliant as the amoral Ethan Skate, with a performance that is eerily timely. uried in all the “meat versus metal” conflict are some messages about individual rights, liberty, the risks of technology, courage, loyalty, and the power of sibling bonds.

The Electric State is one of those films that leaves me feeling “meh”. It’s somewhat violent, with frequent scenes of robot/human combat. People and robots are punched, kicked, thrown, shoved, swiped and stabbed with bladed weapons, and shot with tasers, firearms and fictional energy weapons. Aside from three dozen minor and moderate profanities, other negative content is minor and the PG-13 rating is fair. By no means is it great cinema, but it’s certainly a harmless way for teens and tweens to entertain themselves on a Saturday night. Who knows? It might even make them think about their relationship to technology, tech companies, and the humans around them.